the 524 P4 comes with the alu HSF and that's the one I tested, don't see anything wrong

Again, maximum respect to madshrimps ... as always.

But I see two things wrong with these replies. In order of quote;-

a) classic assumption:- the stock Intel heatsink is matched to the CPU at standard MHZ. It clearly is not. Could Intel have supplied test hardware with a mismatch problem*? Faulty Intel fan*?
b) if you overclock, obviously you MUST upgrade the standard heatsink (DUH!). An Intel copper-core HFS is my recommendation (and maybe lap it to death & use ShinEtsu Microsi paste?).

I also see an - um - tester problem. If the stock Intel heatsink thermal pad was not used (maybe a thin, "high performance" paste was used instead?) and the stock Intel heatsink has a poorly-finished base (rough / convex etc) then there would be inadequate thermal contact with the CPU IHS.

I stand by what I said before ... to use a 20% overclocked "hot running 524" then complain that the stock heatsink/fan is "ear deafening" is complete rubbish. You need to check if the equipment is matched before making statements like this. Especially if you have not confirmed that the supplied heatsink is correct for the stock CPU speed ... and upped the CPU speed by 1/5th - which means _more_ than 1/5th heat generation due to thermal inefficiencies!

*Not your fault, of course. Intel have many suppliers of heatsinks (Sanyo Denkei, Foxconn, Mitac, Delta etc) so maybe they got this one wrong, maybe the fan is defective, maybe the heatsink base is very poorly finished. But I have heard of a 524 overclocked to 4ghz using a lapped all-aluminium Intel heatsink & fan.

don't quite agree with you but will add copper insert Intel HSF in next roundup
the 524 HSF is not defective, read the review again

"The Intel Stock cooling has a temperature regulated fan, trying to keep the CPU temperature below 60°C at all times, when we left the machine running for several HOURS at full load the fan was spinning close to 4300rpm and at 66.8dBA it’s ear deafening. If we only loaded the system for half an hour the fan would reach ~2500rpm this gave a more acceptable 50dBA noise level, on par with some of the other heatsinks tested."

that full alu HSF is still delivered for most models and the fan used a good indicator of noise level at different temp loads, the intel stock hsf has yet to impress me, AMD has, it took heat pipes and copper core; Intel HSF, not very good noise/performance wise, not at all.

- It is a fact that the Intel heatsink was not designed for heatloads like the one you're applying John. Hence the argument that it can "do nothing more but fail" is in my opinion correct. Therefor, I would not consider the Intel heasink a complete failure, but it's still too loud for my taste nonetheless.

- On the other hand : I think the argument to say that you can't test a piece of hardware (in this case the heatsink) for a purpose for which it was not designed (overclocking), is not correct. Two reasons : in my opinion it is not necessarily bad to test a piece of hardware over their spec, to see how it behaves and to see from what point on it would fail (be that noise, temperature or whatever). Second, and most important : the stock heatsink is what you get, and many people will go to work overclocking their cpu starting with this exact HSP. It is only natural then for a reviewer to take into account the performance of this HSP, to inform the people of its capacities.

- It is a fact that the Intel heatsink was not designed for heatloads like the one you're applying John. Hence the argument that it can "do nothing more but fail" is in my opinion correct. Therefor, I would not consider the Intel heatsink a complete failure, but it's still too loud for my taste nonetheless.

in the performance/noise sector it certainly doesn't score very high, small fan, high RPM after extended period of stress test, sorry, it's no good.

To quote a rather more modern gem of wisdom ... Sayng it's so doesn't make it so.

I've got almost silent computing.
With a stock Intel heatsink.
Please re-read post #19 ... Since I made that post I've set my processor to stock speed (2.8ghz) and the stock Intel fan continues to run at 1,258rpm and the CPU shows 41C in Sandra Pro @ ambient 22C. My Abit 'board is reputed for overstating temperatures but that's fine with me - the Intel fan knows what's best for my CPU.

Despite the barracking I will always stand by what I said about this review - an under-spec Intel heatsink was used on an over-spec'd CPU. Result - noise. If I've got that wrong let's agree to differ and move on.

50CM away from front 40.3dBA increases to 43dBA when the stock fan tops at 2,600RPM during OCCT stress run. Not silence, and I don't need too much below 40dBA because my ambient is around 38dBA. I live in a normal house with very little traffic, and 100 ft away from my neigbors.